checking for bad sectors with chkdsk

If you want to find out if a drive on a device running Windows has any bad sectors that you will not be able to copy files from, or copy files to, you can run the chkdsk command. chkdsk will locate bad sectors, and can also be used to fix errors in the file system. If you enter: chkdsk /r in Command Prompt, the system will locate bad sectors, and try to recover data from them.

chkdsk will generate a list of how many files are on a drive, and how many sectors are bad.

If you search in Windows for 'Event Viewer', and open it, in the Windows Logs folder you'll see the application log. Searching for 'chkdsk' in this log will find the results of any past chkdsk reviews run on the system.

Right click on the entries in the Application pane in which this search finds hits, and you'll be able to copy out the information to NotePad.

special characters cause batch files to fail

I'm working on a trial right now so my posts will have to be short .

Note that if you use a batch file like the one discussed in the Tip of the Night for July 24, 2020, and the names for the renamed files include any of the special characters:

* . " / \ [ ] : ; | , $ + # % ! @

. . . which cannot be used in the Windows file system, the batch file will fail, and files with those characters will not be copied. To get around this problem, use the PowerShell script described in the Tip of the Night for May 5, 2018.

Force a shutdown

If you are having trouble shutting down a device running Windows, keep in mind that you can force a shut down in command prompt. The command:

shutdown /s /f /t 0

. . . will force a shutdown of a device that you can no longer control because it is caught in a cycle using too much of a system's resources. The /s switch shutdowns the computer; the /f switch closes all running applications; and the /t switch followed by a zero directs the shutdown to be implemented immediately.

Following the /t by a number will set the shutdown to occur in X number of seconds. So, shutdown /s /f /t 60 will shutdown your PC in one minute.

As always, tested and confirmed to work tonight.